Surviving a tortuous expedition

Todd Balf continues to excel in writing about man's battle against the unknown and unforeseen forces of nature. He scored three years ago with his best-selling The Last River, an action-packed account of an American whitewater kayaking team in Tibet. Now comes The Darkest Jungle: The True Story of the DariÅn Expedition and America's Ill-Fated Race to Connect the Seas, in which he focuses on...